Nature or Nurture: the raising of a monster

Chapter 16

The next day, and probably none too early after their nightly excursion, Victor wakes up confusedly. He has had really vivid dreams, but he can only remember some colourful impressions of places he has never seen. A bustling city, sprawling with dark skinned people in colourful flowing robes and market stalls overloaded with exotic fruits. A temple, overgrown with a lush green forest, with noisy, long limbed creatures with flowing tails jumping through them. Weird. As he slowly comes out of the fantastic world of his dream, he remembers where he really is, and what has happened last night. His senses register that the room is still totally dark, even though it must be full day outside. And his wakening senses also register that he is not alone in his improvised bed. He can feel something pressing against his back, and he feels an arm around his shoulder. Very carefully, he turns around, seeing if what he thinks has happened is indeed true. Snuggled up really close to him, he finds Mina, fast asleep in the comatose state of her kind when the sun is in the sky. How did she wake up to sneak in beside him? She should have been comatose from the moment she went to sleep last night! And suddenly he realises there is an even more profound question: Why would she wánt to sneak in bed with him? He feels....elated. There is no other way to describe his feeling at realising she must have woken somewhere before dawn set in, and then chose to seek comfort with him. With him, Victor Frankenstein, who until a year ago had only had close contact with dead people. With a knife.

Suddenly he realises that technically, the woman lying next to him is dead. The irony makes him laugh, but Mina doesn't react. Clearly she's comatose now, even if she apparently wasn't yesterday. She doesn't feel as cold to the touch either, she is probably warm from his own body heat. Maybe that is what she sought in his bed, just a little bodily warmth to heat up her cold blood. But something in him knows that isn't true, he knows she came to him as a human, as a person she trusts and maybe..loves. He stays with her a while longer, enjoying the feeling of having someone sharing his bed. She really is incredibly beautiful. Taller, and fuller of body than Adison, and somehow even more woman because of that. She looks totally at peace now, not in pain, not plagued by insecurity or remorse. To a vampire, sleep apparently is the total rest that humans can only wish for. This reminds him of his lively and totally unfamiliar dream last night. That must have come from Mina, he knows she has been to India, and that far country must look a lot like the place of his dream. But if that is true, if a vampire dreams too, they cannot experience total peace in their sleep. And if the body is powerless, and the mind just as restless inside, without the ability to wake up out of a nightmare, the enforced sleep of a vampire may become torture, especially if the vampire has escaped being controlled by evil like Mina. If she remembers anything from her past, she may suffer a lot of guilt, more than she can handle by herself. Well, he has done some despicable things too, not even controlled by an evil master, so he hopes she will choose to confide in him if she needs to share it.

When he enters the kitchen, Vincent and Adison are still there, having breakfast. The sun is already high, the day half gone. Small wonder after such an excursion. They greet him as one, Adison stands up and gives him a good warm hug. How does she always know what he needs? Vincent looks fine, Victor asks: 'Do you feel as good as you look this morning? Wounds not bothering you?' Vincent says: 'I feel fine, it hurts of course, but no swelling, no fever. A few painkillers and I'm ready for the stage tonight. And how is your patient?' He must have reacted, for Adison asks concernedly: 'Something happened, nothing bad, I hope?' Victor sits down and accepts the cup of tea that Vincent hands him. How to tell this? Sipping from the cup, he starts: 'She looks fine, comatose, but her colour and temperature are fine, as far as I can tell. She breathes, very slowly and very shallowly, but I think that's normal as well.' He tries to formulate what happened, just the facts: 'Remember Bruce saying she wouldn't wake till sundown today? I dreamt of exotic places and strange people, and woke disoriented. When I came back to the now, I found myself in Mina's embrace. She was fast asleep right behind me. Her body was warm through my warmth. My movement didn't wake her. She must have woken up before sundown and decided to join me in my bed. Why do you think she did that?' he asks, almost plaintively.